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Ike Ekweremadu declares he’s re-contesting for fifth time after serving for fifteen consecutive years

Tuesday, 4 September 2018

Nigerian politician and lawyer from Enugu State Ike Ekweremadu who has served in the Senate of Nigeria since May 2003 has declared his interest to represent his constituency for the fifth time in the senate.

In a statement on Tuesday morning, Ekweremadu averred that he was persuaded by his people to return to the senate.

“My people, the good people of Enugu West Senatorial District, including the Enugu West Peoples Assembly, Members of the National Assembly, Council Chairmen, members of the Enugu State Executive Council, Enugu State Chapter of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, leaders of the PDP from Enugu West, among others gave me a surprise on Sunday.

“They presented to me the PDP nomination form for the Senate, which they purchased for me, requesting that I return to the Senate in 2019.

My people, my primary employers have spoken. I have no choice than to humbly accept to run for the Senate again”, he said.

The Deputy Senate President had since May 2003 represented his people when Chimaroke Nnamani was then governor of Enugu state.

He retained the seat in 2007 when Sullivan Chime on 29 May took over from Chimaroke. Sullivan served for two terms before handing over to Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi. Gburugburu is still serving for his first term and Ekweremadu is still retaining his seat.

Numerically Ekweremadu has served for fifteen (15) consecutive years.

Enugu West senatorial zone constituents, yesterday organised a solidarity march and bought a PDP nomination form in support of Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu in Enugu for his re-election.

The constituents who converged begging him to go back to the Senate come 2019, including the Ohanaeze Ndigbo, said there was no alternative to Ekweremadu at the moment who they said had impacted on their lives.

Presenting the nomination form, the President of Enugu West Parliament, Hon. Paul Anikwe on behalf of Enugu west parliament, described Ekweremadu as “God-sent, a developer and a man of the people”, who honours God and respects mankind.

Ekweremadu continued in his statement:

“Instructively, only a few weeks ago, I reflected on my past engagements with the people of Enugu West and I was satisfied that, by the grace of God, we were able to make so many improvements in the lives of our people.

“I reflected on my next move and the available options. One option is to come back to you in Enugu and run my Foundation, which will give me opportunity to mentor young men and women in leadership.

The second is probably to go to a university and take a fulltime academic job and also try to mentor young people in school. And behold my people came calling.

My people, my primary employers have spoken. I have no choice than to humbly accept to run for the Senate again.

“Nevertheless, I believe that the beauty of democracy is the enlargement of the political space in which everybody is free to participate, bring and exchange ideas, and disagree in order to agree.

Just yesterday, I got a call from a man who introduced himself as an engineer from Achi, but lives in Jigawa. He later came with his family to tell me that he wanted to run for the Senate in Enugu West. I congratulated him and offered to help purchase his nomination form. But he told me he had already bought his form. He was quite surprised when I offered to buy form for him.

But it has always been my philosophy to help nurture the opposition, for as far as I am concerned, all power belongs to God and we should never try to reduce the political space. We must allow and indeed encourage other people to participate.”